Talk:British Columbia Social Credit Party

Pre-1952.

I can find no evidence that the 1937 social credit vehicle "Social Credit League of British Columbia" entered into any alliance for the purpose of fighting the 1945 election, nor can I see anything showing that this purported alliance broke down before the 1949 contest. I conducted most of the research for the "Electoral History of British Columbia" (Chief Electoral Office, 1988) and always had trouble finding even newspaper advertisements from any social credit entity at all. They were indeed small fringe groupings. I DO know, however, that 1949's "British Columbia Social Credit League" was NOT the same grouping, or at least did not possess the identical name, as the group from 1937. In 1945, the contesting group's full and proper name was "Social Credit Association" (SCA), not "alliance", but I will have to check this. It was many years ago now!Chris. Fulker 13:47, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

That equation was made by someone else in the Elections Wikiproject, as I'd originally made different colours/templates for each of the names (BCSCL, SCABC, BCSP), but these were all submerged into one entry as a result of that discussion; I don't have it handy right now but will see if I can dig it out; I hear what you're saying, and wondered about it myself (knowing what chimerical beasties fringe parties in any era are like) and in the end run perhaps different articles on the League and the Alliance and the other precursor groups, or non-precursor groups in some cases I guess, should be written. The Social Credit League of British Columbia remained the name of the party, or the group that became the party, until 1976 or so, correct?Skookum1 22:58, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

PS You worked for Elections BC on the website? Just wondering where in their database, if it's electronified or on paper still, there might be records of the colonial elections; granted as I recall this was often by a show of hands, as also with voting in the early province (can't remember what year the secret ballot came in...same as parties, '03?). I'm about to draft up stubs/starts on Legislative Council of British Columbia, (or is that Executive Council of British Columbia? - yes, but that name still exists IIRC) Executive Council of Vancouver Island. Colonial Assembly of British Columbia (named the same as Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, the provincial one, but named appropriately despite the shared official title), and Legislative Assembly of Vancouver Island and was looking for details of districts, returns, members etc. I have some of the membership/districts esp. from the founding councils/assemblies but know there were other elections, appointments and changes thereafter; there's no one central source for this other than picking through side-references in the old major sources and those written using them, which is how I found the necessary details to start the stubs; there's no one "core history" of the early colony, not in the modern era anyway. I appreciate a lot of what went into the historical elections returns online, by the way; the digging through old newspapers to find the returns, and particularities of some of the recounts and personality profiles and such: I picked through them all while transferring the figures into Wiki format for what you'll find on List of British Columbia general elections during the last round of the Elections Wikiproject; in some cases I hope the riding histories get fully fleshed out, who ran, what the issues were, things that went on in various campaigns; no time to do it myself, but fascinating stuff....Skookum1 23:13, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

British Columbia Social Credit League.

Hi Skookum, I'm new here so not familiar with the technical workings of wikipedia. Nevertheless, I can say that the 1949 BCSCL WAS the organization that WAC Bennett joined in 1951 and then led until 1973. Not the SCLBC, which ran candidates only in 1937. I'm not aware that BC elections results are online, in a poll-by-poll form; the book I worked on was published before this, in 1988. Somebody in the CEO Office added the info about all these social credit groups entering into some kind of alliance; I'd found no evidence of this, but in any case the info is in the book. Re: Colonial legislatures, their debates were all published in a five-volume set around 1989, beautifully done. As I'm now living in Taiwan, all my books are in storage in BC and I can't check but I think the title was "Debates of the Colonial Legislatures" or "Journals of the Colonial Legislatures" more likely. It said little about elections - best bet for that would be in the Victoria Colonist on microfilm I would guess.Chris. Fulker 06:45, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

First lesson; don't use space-indents at the start of paragraphs, it un-wordwraps things in wikicode, to indent - although it indents a whole paragraph, not the first line, use a colon. BCSCL vs SCLBC is something I should have remembered; these guys were more fun than the Groucho-Marxist splinter faction of the APC. As for online elections, the only poll-by-poll ones are modern-era ones, from about 1996 or whatever onwards; all the older ones are by riding only. I'll see if I can find "Journals of the Colonial Legislatures" - you'd think it would be in SFU (which I'm right near), at least on 'fiche or 'film, huh? I think only the Assemblies were elected, the Councils were appointed entirely, I'm pretty sure, but not almost.Skookum1 07:25, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

1952: "Running under the name..." - what?

Bennett took out a memnbership in the BCSCL in 1951, and it was this party which contested the 1952 election. No need to say "Running under the name...the party..." - so I've altered it a bit.Chris. Fulker 08:50, 25 February 2007 (UTC)